Page 70 of Release Me

“Nah, he’d already be gone if they scooped him up.” Frank’s heavy brow furrows with doubt. “And he makes a killing in tips. He’d work here year-round if he could.”

“Yeah, I know. That’s the problem. Two weeks ago, he asked me if I’d consider hiring him on full-time.” But I can’t afford another salary. Frank helps me run the coffee shop year during the offseason, and the tour and rentals side shuts down at the end of October until March. “And now there’sthis.” I stab the local newspaper with my index finger, drawing Frank’s attention to the job fair announcement at the Wolf Hotel.

He tips his head to read it, showing off the hint of gray at his temples. At forty-four years old, Frank looks closer to my thirty-one. “This is for seasonal, not full time.”

“To start, sure, but as if they wouldn’t be clambering to hire Jeremy year-round once he’s proven himself.” He’s reliable, punctual, and the hardest worker Sea Witch has ever had.

Frank pauses as if in thought. “You honestly think he’d leave us for Wolf?”

“I never thought Dave would leave us, and see what just happened!” I throw a hand toward the door. “Jeremy booked Friday off. Heneverbooks time off.” Luckily, we don’t have any cruises scheduled for that day.

“No, he doesn’t,” Frank agrees reluctantly.

“What if he leaves me? We’ll be down toonecaptain.” AJ, who worked for us last year and is reliable enough, though notthe most personable. Honestly, I wasn’t going to hire him again this year, but I’m desperate. “How am I going to replace someone as good as Jeremy? People ask for himby name!” I stab at my computer screen, to the notes section of repeat bookers. Whininess laces my voice.

“He still works here today. If he’s gone next week, we’ll deal with it then.” Frank gives my shoulder another comforting squeeze. “This isn’t the first time someone has quit on us out of the blue.”

“I knew this was going to happen. Iknewthat stupid hotel was going to swoop in to takeallthe best workers, and then what are we going to be left with? The lazy, untrustworthy plugs. Wolf is ruining Mermaid Beach’s entire vibe, and it’s not even open yet!”

Not that the feeling hadn’t already shifted for those like me who grew up here, casting fishing lines and running barefoot to the ice cream shop. Somewhere along the line, the quaint Florida cottages were replaced by looming coastal mansions and condos, and dozens of new businesses cropped up almost overnight—there are now three other tiki bar cruise companies to compete with ours. Popular travel magazines wrote articles about the area, throwing around comparisons to the Hamptons and Nantucket, and all these bougie Northeasterners who can’t afford to vacation in those areas flocked here, driving up the prices of everything—houses, taxes, food. A lot of locals can’t afford to live here anymore. So many of them are cashing out and leaving.

Some people argue the change has brought good things to the community, but I disagree. We were doing just fine. Change is what brought those surveyors to the land next door to my home—acres that had been sitting vacant for decades, not worth developing. Fast-forward five years and there’s now an eyesore where only swaying sea oats along sand dunes and a serene grove of bramble and copper woods existed before.

“Sloane … Don’t start up on this again. It does you no good,” Frank warns.

“I’m not. I swear.” Poor Frank has had to listen to me rant about all things Wolf Hotel for years. I dragged him to town council meetings to try to stop the build, but all those assholes care about is how much money and prestige the Wolf name will bring to Mermaid Beach. “But tell me it doesn’t bother you that it’s there.Rightbeside our home.”

“It is what it is. There’s no point fighting it anymore. You tried, and you lost. Now, it’s time to let go. Who knows, they could bring us more business.”

“People who pay a thousand bucks a night for a hotel room aren’t coming to the Sea Witch to stand in line for syrup-laced coffees and to rent beach equipment, Frank.”

He shrugs. “You could have sold to them. They made you a good offer.”

“I’m not selling!”

Frank’s eyebrows arch with reproach.

“I’mnotselling Gigi’s house,” I repeat, tempering my tone. She bought that property back when you could still scoop up acres for cheap. And while she claims she prefers her nursing home now that her body is giving up on her, it would kill her to see the place torn down for more sterile mansions or, worse, an expansion on that hotel. “I’ve lived in that house all my life.Youlive there. A lot of our staff consider it their home over the summer.” In trailers Gigi collected over the years to provide cheap accommodations to the Sea Witch family, as she likes to refer to them. Hell, Dave and Teddy are supposed to stay there!

“And you don’t have to,” Frank says calmly. “Now, speaking of lazy, untrustworthy plugs, guess who I heard is applying at Wolf?” He waits a beat before relieving me of the suspense. “Cody.”

I snort, even as hearing that name makes my stomach clench with dread. “Good. They deserve that sorry sack.”

“They won’t hire him.”

“Please. If there’s one thing Cody is good at, it’s fooling people into thinking he’s a decent guy.” He sure fooled me. He had zero experience and yet I hired him as a captain, and then I dated the bastard for a year before saying yes to his proposal.

“I always knew what he was about.”

“Yeah, thanks for warning me.”

The flat glare I get in return is almost comical. Frank’s not one to stick his nose into other people’s business, but he did grumble about Cody’s work ethic. I ignored him because customers loved Cody so much. And because I loved him.

After Gigi officially signed the properties and the business over to me and left for the nursing home, things changed. Cody moved into my house and began introducing himself as an owner around here. He helped himself to cash from the safe on occasion, to cover his truck payments and other loans. He picked fights with Frank almost daily to try to force him to move.

But it was the day Cody showed up with that negotiated offer for my land that the light bulb went off and I realized we werenevergoing to work. He might have truly loved me, but he loved the idea of getting his hands on all that money more.

It’s been a year since I kicked Cody’s ass out and I’m still angry with myself for not seeing through him from day one. When I think about that momentary lapse of judgment where I considered putting him on the deed to my house, I feel like vomiting.

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